Books and Their Covers
by Amanda9
Summary: There are many reasons to hide your face in the friendly pages of a book: Knowledge, interest, curiosity, fear – maybe it isn’t fear as much as it’s shame.


**Title: ****_Books and Their Covers  
_By: **Amanda  
**Feedback:** sweety167yahoo.ca  
**Rating:** G  
**Spoilers: **none  
**Disclaimer:** All Characters are the property of JK Rowling.  
**Summary:** There are many reasons to hide your face in the friendly pages of a book: Knowledge, interest, curiosity, fear – maybe it isn't fear as much as it's shame. Hermione fic.  
**Completed:** March 10, 2005

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There are many reasons to hide your face in the friendly pages of a book: Knowledge, interest, curiosity, fear – maybe it isn't fear as much as it's shame. 

You've always had one of those _unique_ faces with _character_; you just didn't always know it. When you're small and young there's an idealism where you're cute and happy, until someone tells you otherwise.

"Don't worry, I'm sure she'll grow into that face," they say with all sympathetic and mournful. Tisking as if your face was a great pity, like something was wrong with having a broad brow and strong nose, even powerful teeth. Surely that lady in the park was wrong, or had some strange ideas.

And you think that, you're sure of it, until Mum and Dad's friends begin saying the same things. A shake of their heads and that 'I'm sorry' tone.

"But I'm sure she'll grow into those teeth."

It's hard for a little girl to hear that over and over, and not think about. Not begin to worry about it. Especially as it becomes an almost daily occurrence.

Going out and showing your face becomes troublesome; worried about what every person in the park saw and thought. It's no wonder girls become obsessed about the way they look. It was worse as the other children began to comment (the creative descriptions of your teeth and hair the schoolyard can come up with).

You never want to leave the house; you never want to face another person and their twisted opinion of you. You refuse to go back to the park or face the family visits. Your parents try; telling you how special you are, how very pretty they think you are. But they're parents, and that's their job. They're ment to say that and tell you that- but they're idealism is far worse then yours could ever be. They tell you that you can't hide away, but that's all you want to do.

There aren't any masks, and you can't just pull a bag over your head like you want to. They won't let you hollow up in your room, they're pulling you out and insist on parading you around. And you're scared and you're ashamed because others have made you that way.

So you hide, out in the open you hide. You open a book and cover your face with it. And no one questions it. No one wonders why the once open girl crawls into a book whenever anyone's around. No one seems to notice, and no one seemed to care that you are hiding.

You find words and images and comfort in the bound pages. You begin escaping in foreign stories and learning of new worlds, new ideas. You become desperate to find and learn every secret hidden in the books that hide you. Being your only friends, you trade tales, adventures and ideas with them. You learn.

And slowly Mum and Dad's friends start saying new things.

"Look how smart she is. What a clever girl." Pride replaces pity and they smile now, when they shake their heads it's now in wonder. Those in the park only see the diligent student now, not a peculiar looking girl.

And it becomes so easy for you; so easy to stay behind the covers, so easy to soak up all their knowledge. So easy to meld with it. You became the smart girl, the student with top grades, the…know-it-all. But it's been so much easier this way. It's so much easy to take the teasing about being smart. You can tell yourself they are jealous, you can even believe that. You can believe, now, that you are special, that you're more than bushy hair and big teeth; you're smart, you're clever, and dare it, you're even better.

Only it's easy for you to get lost, trapped in the escape. It's easy to lose sight of the world outside of the safe and friendly pages. It's too easy to forget that there are other places out there with other people to meet. Other people you can reach out for and join. New places to see, new things to learn, new friends to be made Not all friends are paper or trapped in books, you just have to crawl out of the pages to be with them. Because what you read can mean nothing without action.

End.


End file.
